Mission: Kill and Rescue
by QingLi
Summary: HPNaruto crossover. Takes place after the HalfBlood Prince. Naruto is sent on a mission far away from the Fire Country so he can be someone else's problem. Harry's determined not to return to Hogwarts. What changes his mind, and why is Naruto's mission su
1. Meditation

"Clear your mind..."

This was one of the hardest things Harry had ever tried to do. It was right up there with not losing his temper when he stayed with the Dursleys and being civil to Severus Snape. On occasion though, Harry had somewhat managed to do both of the above. Clearing his mind, however, and not allowing his emotions gain the upper hand was something he felt he could never accomplish. As much as Harry wanted to give up, he knew he couldn't. On the night that Dumbledore died, when Harry had chased after Snape, he had realized how important it was that he learn to close his mind. His attacks, one after another were blocked again and again. Afterwards, Harry had cursed himself for not working harder when Dumbledore had made him study Occlumency. Now he faced the enormous challenge of learning it by himself.

Unfortunately, it was exceedingly difficult to concentrate or focus on anything when his Uncle Vernon was thundering around the house spluttering and shouting in fury.

"The nerve of that boy, who does he think he is, bringing home two of _those people_! I tell you Petunia, we'll be murdered in our beds or worse, wake up as toads!"

As per Dumbledore's wishes, Harry returned one last time, to Number Four Privet Drive. His Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon had no choice but to grudgingly accept him, for the last time, into their home. The Dursleys had dreaded Harry's arrival, imagine their surprise when Harry informed them that his two friends would be accompanying and staying with the Dursleys as well. Mr. Dursley's face went purple with rage and disbelief.

"Now wait just a second!" he thundered, "What makes you think you can just come and order me around like that?"

Harry then proceeded to firmly inform his uncle that his two friends had come of age and that they could perform magic at any time they desired. Upon hearing this, Mr. Dursley paled considerably and with a painfully forced smile he led Ron, Hermione, and Harry to the van.

It had been almost a month since the day Mr. Dursley had picked up the three wizards at King's Cross Station. He vaguely remembered "the old coot", Dumbledore, telling him that Harry only needed to stay one night to renew the charm. The Dursleys had expected him gone by the next morning. What they hadn't expected was seeing Harry and his two friends day after day for almost a month, and showing no signs of leaving. Finally, Mr. Vernon had had enough and confronted Harry with it.

"I have let you and your friends stay for a month. According to that old coot, you could have been gone the day after I picked you and your freak friends up at the train station. You ungrateful brat, I want you out of this house as soon as possible."

Harry gazed coolly at Uncle Vernon, "'That old coot' is Dumbledore, and I wouldn't stay here a second longer than I needed to."

"THEN WHY THE HELL HAVE YOU STAYED HERE SO LONG!"

"I'm not seventeen yet. I still can't perform magic. I might as well stay and be protected instead of trying to protect myself and getting my wand snapped." Harry explained it patiently as though Vernon were a small child, which only made his uncle turn a darker shade of purple.

Truth be told, Harry found this arrangement almost as unbearable as his Uncle Vernon. The words he used to explain why he was still there were almost word for word from the letter he had received at the beginning of the month from Moody. He had been crossing the days off of his calendar since the day he arrived. _One more day...and I'll be free_.

* * *

"...but why?"

Tsunade's eye twitched, the morning wasn't even over and she was already in desperate need of a bottle of sake and a very long nap.

"You will do the missions assigned to you Naruto," Tsunade said through gritted teeth, "The village is already swamped with missions and I can't afford to send anyone off to look for Sasuke, who _willingly_ went to Orochimaru."

"You old hag," Naruto muttered under his breath. He then spun around and was out the door, "I'm going to train."

Tsunade clenched her hands and resisted the urge to hurl the desk out the window. A moment later a smile began to appear on her face and she then started to search feverishly through the large pile of paper on her desk.

_"__The nerve of him, who does he think he is? All those genin brats deserve a rude awakening. I__'__m going to send them as far as possible. A D-rank mission far, far away from here,__"_Tsuande's smile grew wider as she found what she was looking for, _"__Aha! Perfect...__"_

QingLi: What did you think? I'm sorry it was so short but I'm still trying to work it all out. I also know that HPNaruto crossovers are a bit overdone and it gets tiring reading the same things and seeing the same plot over and over again, and I'm sorry if you didn't like it. Please leave a review though and let me know what you think!

Disclaimer: Harry Potter and the characters from the book are not mine. Naruto and the characters from the anime/manga are not mine either. SO STOP HARASSING ME!


	2. So it begins

The next morning, Naruto returned to Tsunade. He planned to beg Tsunade to let him go look for Sasuke, determined not to leave until he had achieved his goal. The last thing he expected was to find the other genin, plus Shikamaru gathered there. 

"...our client has offered a great deal more than the required money for the completion of this mission..."

Naruto bristled with the unfairness of it all. If a client offered more than the required payment, then some kind of danger had to be involved. Maybe Tsunade was sending all of the others on an A-rank mission. Why else would she send so many people at once? Besides on such a dangerous mission maybe they would meet someone who could lead them to Sasuke.

"You old hag Tsunade," Naruto threw open the office door and glared at the Hokage, "Why do they get a dangerous mission? I've been asking and asking for a month now. No fair!"

Tsunade glared at Naruto, but a moment later that glare transformed into an amused smirk.

"So you want to go on this mission as well, Naruto?"

"Yeah, yeah, you bet I do!" Naruto replied excitedly.

Tsunade faked a sigh of resignation, "Fine, go."

Naruto grinned and started shouting and celebrating. Finally an exciting mission, he was bound to find some clues leading to Sasuke.

Naruto grabbed Shikamaru's and Sakura's wrists, dragging them out of the door, "...let's go! Come on hurry up!"

The others quickly followed Naruto out the door, leaving Tsunade alone in her office. She grinned and congratulated herself. Boy, Naruto was in for a rude awakening when he realized what kind of mission she sent him on.

* * *

Through his window at Number Four Privet Drive, Harry watched the sun slowly rise. He felt, that this was one of the most important sunrises in his life. It marked the day he turned seventeen and finally came of age in the wizarding world. He was an adult now, and finally able to perform magic outside of school. The sunrise also marked the end of his stay with the Dursleys, a day he Harry had been waiting for since he was first brought to live at Number Four. 

With this feeling of contentedness, Harry felt a small stab of pain. Sirius should have been here. Sirius would have celebrated Harry's release from his relatives. Harry should have been going off to live with his godfather, but that would never happen. Sirius was dead.

Despite what everyone, including Dumbledore, had told him, Harry still placed most of the blame for Sirius'death on himself. On top of that, Harry also felt partially responsible for Dumbledore's death. If only he had been able to close his mind...

Snape was right. No matter how much Harry despised his former teacher; there was no denying that Harry should have learned close his mind. He could have learned to perform non-verbal spells. There was no way to learn now; there was no way Harry could go back to Hogwarts. If he wanted to learn, he would have to learn on his own.

Harry was interrupted by his thoughts as Ron and Hermione burst into the room with wide smiles on their faces.

"Happy Birthday Harry!" they both chorused loudly, Hedwig hooted cheerfully from her cage.

Harry knew that in a few moments, his Uncle Vernon would be at his bedroom door purple in the face and raving like a madman, completely ignorant, as usual, to the fact that it was his nephew's birthday. Nevertheless, Harry's face still broke into a grin. It didn't matter, anymore, really. He would be gone soon anyways.

Harry raised his eyebrow as his Uncle Vernon came thundering across the hall and appeared right behind Hermione and Ron, muttering furiously under his breath.

"...blasted bird...should have shot...those freaks...still in my house..."

"...Boy..."Uncle Vernon never finished his sentence; he didn't dare, seeing as there were now three wands pointed directly at his chest.

Harry glared at his uncle, who was now staring back petrified, his piggy little eyes darting back and forth for a way to escape or distract his nephew.

Hermione twirled around and pointed her wand at Harry's trunk and Hedwig's cage, shrinking them. Harry pocketed both, and Hedwig took off through the open window. The three friends all lowered their wands and walked slowly out of the door, leaving a trembling Vernon Dursley leaning weakly against the wall. A moment later three jets of light shot back into the room accompanied by two shouts of _"__Scourgify!__"_ The room was left sparkling clean and spotless. No one was there to see it though, Petunia and Dudley had wisely decided not to leave the safety of their rooms, and Vernon had fainted.

Outside Number Four Privet Drive, Harry and Ron collapsed onto the front steps, too overcome by laughter to stay standing.

"Did you see his face?" Ron guffawed.

"Priceless," Harry gasped out.

Hermione pursed her lips and tried to look disapproving, "You know, we probably shouldn't have done that."

"Oh come on Hermione,"Ron said, "you know they deserved it, and admit it, that was hilarious."

Hermione tried to frown, but ended up smiling instead, "You know what? You're right," she said, shocking Ron into silence and turning him a rosy pink.

"Come on,"Harry interrupted, "let's go, or we'll be late."

"Yeah, and mum's already worried out of her mind," Ron added.

The three ran to the side of the house, hiding in the long morning shadows. A moment later, they were gone.

* * *

Around noon that same day, Naruto, Sakura, Shikmaru, Ino, Chouji, Hinata, Shino, Kiba, Neji, TenTen, and Lee met at the main gates of the village to meet their client. Naruto could hardly contain his excitement. 

"Where is our client? For such an important person, he sure doesn't know how to show up on time. I want to leave already!"

They all stared at Naruto in bewilderment. How is it possible for him to get so excited about such a...lame mission?

"Naruto, do you understand kind of mission we've been assigned?" Shikamaru asked carefully.

"Uhh,"Naruto paused for a moment and scratched his head, grinning sheepishly, "No."

Everyone sweatdropped.

"You mean you didn't even ask what kind of mission this was before you volunteered yourself? What an idiot," smirked Ino.

"What?... What?"asked Naruto agitatedly, "It doesn't matter anyways, I heard the old hag Tsunade say that the client's paying lots for this mission. Someone would only do that if it was really dangerous, right? And if it's really dangerous then maybe somehow Akatsuki or Orochimaru is involved. So I can find clues leading to Sasuke too. Right? Right?"

"..."

Everyone looked at each other, unsure of what to do. Shikamaru decided that it wasn't his problem and sat down to watch clouds until their client arrived. Neji watched with carefully concealed amusement, waiting for the moment Naruto would completely lose it. Hinata stepped up and tried to tell Naruto the truth, but no one could hear her. When Naruto asked her to repeat it, Hinata became too embarrassed and said nothing more. The others just stared at Naruto in stunned silence. Finally Lee walked up to Naruto and took one of his hands.

"Naruto, our client has paid us an unbelievable amount of money for this mission."

"See? I was right!" exclaimed Naruto joyfully.

"No, Naruto, that's not all. He has paid for a D-rank mission."

"Huh?" Naruto had stopped celebrating for a moment to try and comprehend what Lee had just said.

Ten minutes later, Naruto was still trying to work out what was going on. Ino, Sakura, and TenTen were all gritting their teeth and trying not to strangled Naruto for his stupidity. Finally as their client finally showed up, Kiba turned to Naruto and told him.

"You volunteered yourself to clean a school for a whole year."

"WHAAAAAT?"

QingLi: Wow it's been a while. School's taking up more time than I ever thought possible. Anyways a very late Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all! As usual I hoped you enjoyed it. Review and cross your fingers that I'll be able to get another chapter up by tomorrow. Otherwise prepare for a long wait...at least til Spring Break.

Disclaimer: Harry Potter and the characters from the book are not mine. Naruto and the characters from the anime/manga are not mine either. SO STOP HARASSING ME!


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